Another quiet one

Another night alone. The house is starting to feel very quiet now. Aggie's back tomorrow evening, which is great, cos two nights is nice & relaxing, any more than that & I start going a bit wierd. I don't do very well at living on my own, as any of you who were reading while Aggie was in Hospital in November might remember.

Having said that, I'm looking forward to another quiet evening - although no sleep for me tonight as the final two episodes of Lost series 1 are on, so I'm staying up to watch them both. No spoilers please, I've made it this far through the series avoiding the US blogs/reviews/debates, and I want it to be a surprise:-)

I had a long chat to my mum this morning about work. She is a volunteer for the company I work for, and has a long history with them (when I applied for the job I wasn't sure if her name would be a benefit or a detriment to getting it. I still haven't decided!). She has had many fallings out with my bosses - although being a volunteer they can't sack her:-), and recommended I stick it out & just tell them what I will & won't do & ignore everything else. I wonder if that will work? I have twice put in writing my intention to work fixed days (I'm even happy to flexible on the hours, but it costs me £90 childcare each day, and I'm only paid approx £175 per week, so extra days of childcare=a net loss), but I still get "compulsory" meetings arranged for me on other days. I wonder what they'll do if I just refuse to go to a "compulsory" meeting. Or even worse, if I insist on overtime pay!

I may have to start using public transport to get everywhere too, as they have refused to give me a car (breaking the UK employment law in the process) as I am part time. They have aknowledged they are breaking the law (verbally), but tell me "it's our policy". I know I should have persued this, but I just didn't have the time or energy. I've been through an (almost) industrial tribunal before & it's stressfull!

I have pretty much given up any hope of getting a decent reference off them when I do leave, and they can't make my life much more difficult than they are doing, so there's no real point
in being nice any more.

On the plus side, I had a succesful meeting today. Another ClubMark one - a first session to explain what they have to do. They were much more organised than I thought they would be, so I'm hopefull they should be well on their way to gaining the award in a couple of months. I need to try to follow up some other clubs too - but one is in Penzance, and one in Ilfracombe & they are both buggers to get to! Maybe I'll try kicking some of the closer ones that have stalled instead:-)